Evolutionary conflicts of interest between family members are expected to influence patterns of parental investment. In altricial birds, despite providing the same kind of parental care, patterns of investment in different offspring can differ between parents, a situation termed parentally...

The pattern of parental investment (PI) seen in nature is a product of the simultaneous resolution of conflicts of interest between the members of a family. How these conflicts are resolved depends upon the mating system, the genetic mechanism, on whether extra PI affects current or future...